


If you waterworks, I'll waterworks...

by least_common_variant



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-03
Updated: 2018-11-03
Packaged: 2019-08-17 03:33:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 984
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16508594
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/least_common_variant/pseuds/least_common_variant
Summary: Shitty knows Lardo is his soulmate... but he can never tell her.





	If you waterworks, I'll waterworks...

**Author's Note:**

> from a prompt on Pillowfort, originally posted there - "Bad Soulmate AU's: When they cry, you cry. Literally. No matter what." I didn't think it was *that* bad obviously. :) 
> 
> Check, Please! and its characters are by Ngozi Ukazu.

It's a good thing neither one of them is really much of a crier - and they definitely don't cry in front of people, even each other. Shitty tries to keep up the carefree front. Lardo can't appear weak in front of the hockey team. But over Thanksgiving break her freshman year, his sophomore, Lardo goes home to visit her family and gets the "Art school? What are you going to do with your life with a degree in art?" lecture from two different aunts, and Shitty wakes up sobbing at 2 AM.

Shitty knows all about soulmates - everyone knows about the crying thing, and his mother made it very clear that the whole idea was heterosexist patriarchal bullshit and yes there are people who have this supposedly fated link between them but _fate-schmate_ they still have agency in relationships and they still get to consent to any romantic or sexual interaction and don't let anyone tell anyone otherwise. So, since he wasn't dreaming about anything worth an ugly-cry over, he's got a pretty good idea that, somewhere out there, his soulmate is having one themself (hey, it doesn't have to be heterosexist…) for some reason. A brief rundown of people he's felt particularly sympatico towards doesn't narrow it down much - one or two clearly have a soulmate of their own, but the list is still long enough to leave him with a mystery.

Fortunately for him, he doesn't have to live in suspense much past the end of break. Even after only a couple months, Lardo is one of the best friends he's ever had, and vice versa - so who else is she going to vent to about her uber-traditionalist relatives who just don't get it (a subject he has a certain familiarity with himself)? When she mentions that at the time, she just couldn't deal, and she wrapped herself around her plush duckie and had a good cry, he pulled her a little closer against him on the bench and processed a sequence of emotions. 

Thrilled. Out of everyone on his mental list, he has to admit Lardo was one of the people he was hoping it was. As weird as it was to be thinking in those terms, he could already see himself spending the rest of his life with her… which is a pretty good sign that, yeah, probably soulmates.

Frustrated. It's probably a conflict of interest for one of the players to date the team manager, soulmate or no, right? except...

Horrified. His mother's lecture returns to him in all its spectacular glory. Lardo gets agency. Lardo gets to consent. And for all that they're BFFs and he's happy to be that, she's never expressed any interest in dating him? He's not even 100% sure she's interested in guys? Fuck. He… can't tell her. Can't say a word. Can't… change a thing about their friendship, which is still awesome and fulfilling on its own.

Can't… let her find out about the crying thing. Which means he can't… ever… cry, or let anyone realize he's crying along with her when she does.

It is, as noted, a good thing that Shitty isn't really a crier to begin with. And Lardo? She doesn't cry often, thankfully, and it's always at night. When she's alone and can cling to her duckie. When Jack's asleep and the bathroom is between them anyways so he won't hear Shitty sobbing for literally no reason (one time the reason was a messy breakup, once or twice the reason was a messy critique, and there's always the real mess of family expectations...). The mornings after he's always sure to be there for her. To offer her whatever she needs, whatever she wants, be it hugs, coffee, or a friendly ear, without letting on that he knows. To still be the best friend who will help her bedazzle a jock at 3 AM the night before her project is due. 

He keeps it up until just before graduation. There are a couple close calls - at her junior show she almost, almost loses it after he gets the text from Harvard, he can feel the tears edging up, but she keeps it together until she's in a place where she can let it go. But when he gives her his dibs and offers her his handshake, and instead he gets tackle-hugged in a hail of gummy bears and, yes, tears, it's over.

"No-no-no, dude..."

She looks up at him and sees the tears running down his face. "You… We…. We're…" she stammers, and she smiles, and then the floodgates open again, and neither one of them is sure which one of them started it.

Once the tears stop and the faces are dried - his on a sweatshirt sleeve, hers on a red plaid shirt that she's pretty sure is actually Jack's - they crawl back into the Haus through the window and sneak back into Shitty's room.

"You knew?"

"Yeah, but I thought you didn't want…"

"You asshole, I wanted, I kind of hoped, you always knew when I had a rough night, but I thought you didn't want, you never said anything, you never…"

"I didn't want to put pressure on you to…"

"You went overboard… How long?"

"November. Umm. 2012."

She throws her sweatshirt at him; it's the least he deserves for keeping this from her for _two and a half years_. Then she climbs into his lap; they have a backlog of makeouts to catch up on, and they will never manage it if they don't get started...

They never really say anything to anyone about it, but nobody is really surprised when Shitty shows up at the Haus a lot more than any alumnus in recent memory for the first year after he graduates. And years later, Shitty can't help but marvel at how _fate-schmate_ set him up to spend his life as his best friend's lover.


End file.
